Charter schools boost test scores, nothing else - The Boston Globe

When it comes to helping poor and minority students get better test scores, good charter schools really do seem to make a difference.

However — and it’s a big caveat — a new study suggests that the benefits stop at the school door. Charters may boost test scores, but they don’t help students get better jobs or earn higher incomes. It’s a dramatic finding, made newly possible by the fact that the charter movement is just old enough that we can begin to trace its long-term impact.

Come November, a ballot question will give Massachusetts voters the right to decide whether the state should add more charter schools. This latest finding provides new ammunition to the anti-charter forces in what is shaping up to be one of the state’s most hard-fought ballot battles.

Charters help with tests, but not much else

This isn’t some advocate-funded study. It’s from a pair of widely respected researchers — one at Harvard, one at Princeton — whose previous research had seemed to support the promise of charter schools.

Using detailed data from schools across Texas, they’ve tried to tease out the relationship between charter school performance and success in the job market. And what they found is that the relationship is actually quite weak.

While high-quality charter schools do improve test scores, they don’t seem to help kids get better jobs or earn more money.

That’s surprising, to say the least. Generally speaking, better test scores translate into better jobs. So it was reasonable to assume the same link held for charter schools. Except that doesn’t seem to be the case — not even with the highest-performing charter schools.

Perhaps most striking were the results for the “no excuses” brand of charter schools, which combine strict behavioral rules with longer school days and extended school years.

No excuses schools have a particularly strong track record, including in Texas, where “no excuses” schools were associated with higher test scores, elevated high school graduation rates, and even some improvement in terms of college success.